Very informative book, filled with details (which I like!). Tells of the beginning of mass produced maps, which also corresponds to when North America is discovered. Very well written. - GregInteresting but overly detailed - Rich ( )

The earth is placed in the central region of the cosmos, standing fast in the center, equidistant from all other parts of the sky . . . . It is divided into three parts, one of which is called Asia, the second Europe, the third Africa . . . . Apart from these three parts of the world there exists a fourth part, beyond the ocean, which is unknown to us.--Isidore of Seville, Etymologies (circa A.D. 600)

Dedication

To the four parts of my little world: Catherine, Emma, Kate, and Sage

First words

Old maps lead you to strange and unexpected places, and none does so more ineluctably than the subject of this book: the giant, beguiling Waldseemüller world map of 1507.

Quotations

Last words

What the map ultimately charts, in other words, is nothing less than the contours of the human experience itself: the never-ending attempt to imagine a place for ourselves in the world.

A chronicle of the early sixteenth-century creation of the Waldseem?uller map offers insight into how monks, classicists, merchants, and other contributors from earlier periods shaped the map's creation.